


Borrowed Time

by obsessivemuch



Category: Dead Like Me, Pushing Daisies
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fusion, Character Death, Community: apocalyptothon, Crossover, F/M, Gen, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-05-17
Updated: 2010-05-17
Packaged: 2017-10-28 13:41:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,477
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/308439
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/obsessivemuch/pseuds/obsessivemuch
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When the Reapers meet Ned and Chuck in Coeur d’Coeurs, there are questions that can't be answered easily. It seems like they all live on borrowed time.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Borrowed Time

**Author's Note:**

  * For [afrocurl](https://archiveofourown.org/users/afrocurl/gifts).



> Written for Apocalyptothon  
> Request: George and Mason come upon Chuck and Ned after a biological weapon hits the earth as the Reapers go hunting for souls while Ned tries to bring people back

On the day that a lab in Coeur d’Coeurs accidentally released a biological weapon into the general populace, Georgia Lass woke up in a sketchy motel with a Post-It accordion on her bedside table. A cup of coffee sat nearby the standard-issue clock which displayed the ungodly hour of six AM. "Jesus Christ," George muttered, but she shifted into a sitting position and sipped the warm coffee gratefully. As the warm, sweet caffeine flowed into her veins, she finally glanced at her traveling companion. "Did you ever go to sleep, Mason?"

"Nah, nah, couldn't fucking sleep," he said, the jittery tone giving away the reason for his sleeplessness. "We should probably get moving, Georgie. The first reap is soon and the place isn't that close."

She flipped through the accordion of Post-Its and winced at the brutal schedule in front of them. "When Roxy suggested a vacation, I thought she actually meant a vacation with actual rest, not a field trip to help an entire town find their lights."

"Whatever it is, it must be a fucking terrible way to go."

As they so occasionally were, Mason's words proved prophetic. They pulled into town around eight AM as the sidewalks were just starting to fill with the people who were opening their shops for the morning. "You’ve got to be kidding me. It's like they built the town on fucking quaintness," George said, parking her rental car near a tiny little pie shop. The crowds of townsfolk greeted each other with friendly waves and cheerful hellos, leaving George with a strong urge to vomit. She had never missed Seattle more. "There is not enough fucking coffee in the world to deal with this shithole."

Mason poked her in the side and pointed at a giant cloud of green fumes that was floating down the hillside. "That looks like an unpleasant way to die."

"Thank God. Here's your half of the stack," she said, shoving a pile in his direction. He glanced at the pile with disinterest and swigged from his flask. "Try to stay sober long enough to finish the job." It was a half-hearted attempt to keep Mason on track, one that she was almost sure would succeed. She looked at the first name on the Post-It. Luckily, it was fairly easy to match to Brown's General Store and a quick review of the first few Post-Its showed that the entire clan was doomed to die together. They both set to work, corralling the souls in the middle of the street as they worked in tandem with the people who were emerging onto the sidewalk, gasping and choking from the noxious gas. Somewhere in the last few years together, George and Mason had become a team who barely needed to do much more than looking at each other.

As she worked, George gradually became aware that a couple of the souls were wandering away from the center of the street. "Hey, hey," she called as one disappeared into thin air. She glanced toward his body immediately and saw a pair of strangers kneeling near his body, seemingly unaffected by the thick green cloud that the air was turning into. "Mason," she hissed, and her companion turned to look at her in confusion. "Look!"

His blue eyes widened. "Hey, they can’t do that," he said.

"Obviously, they can." George strode toward the pair, Mason at her heels. "What the fuck do you think you’re doing?"

The woman was wearing a bright orange dress with huge sunglasses. She looked delighted to see them. "How are you still alive?"

"Chuck," the man said, glancing at his watch worriedly. "It’s time." He touched the man’s shoulder and the soul reappeared at George’s side again.

"It’s such a shame," the woman-who-may-have-been-Chuck answered. "Mr. McCoy was a really nice man. He used to give me free lollipops when I was a child." Mr. McCoy nodded proudly.

"I never got free lollipops." The man stood and nodded at them. "I’m Ned and this is Chuck." He very clearly kept his hands down at his side.

Instead of introducing herself, George flung a new question at them. "Are you Reapers?"

"Reapers?" Ned’s confusion was more than enough to answer George’s question.

"How are you fucking up our Reaps then? How are you still alive if you’re not Reapers?"

Mason shifted on his feet and shouted ineffectually, "Yeah!"

Chuck smiled widely at them. "We think that it has to do with Ned’s gift. You see, he can bring dead people to life for a short time."

From the discomfort on Ned’s face, George could tell that it wasn’t a secret he wanted revealed to perfect strangers. "So what’s your excuse?"

"Oh, I’m dead already. Ned brought me back."

"Just now?"

Her smile faltered. "No, about five years ago."

George’s eyes narrowed. "That’s not really a short time." For a moment, she wondered if Ned could touch her and bring her back to life. Could she go back to her family, magically alive after a few years of being missing? Could she leave Happy Time and her Der Waffle Haus family behind?

The woman swallowed and prepared to say something, but Ned interrupted. "What are you doing here? What is Reaping?"

"We take people’s souls before they can suffer too much," Mason answered instead. "Georgie . . ."

"Yeah, I know, Mason," she said. "Keep your hands off the victims, Ned. You’re only hurting them worse because they can feel the gas in their lungs when you bring them choking back to life."

"They deserve the chance to say goodbye," Chuck said furiously.

George looked away, catching Mason’s sympathetic expression. Hadn’t she been given the chance to say goodbye to her family after she died? But she didn’t feel like it was fair to conflate the two. She was going to suffer for a long ass time in order to have that chance. She might never see her own lights, but these poor suckers who were dying or dead would walk into their lights without the same punishment. "Why do they deserve that chance, but other people don’t? I’ve never heard of anyone with Ned’s gift before and he can’t cover all the dead people in the world. What makes that guy so much more special than the old lady that just dropped dead in her kitchen at this very moment? At least these people get to go without pain, but you steal that away from them every time you put their ripped souls back into their fucking bodies and force them to relive the end of their life. Let’s go, Mason."

"Wait," Ned said, putting his hand on her. She felt her whole body shudder under his fingers as he stepped back with fear in his eyes, but she felt no different after all. Go fucking figure that the man who might be able to undo everything couldn’t undo her living death either. "That’s never happened before."

"I’m already dead, you idiot," she spat and turned on her heel. "We have souls to reap. Stay out of our fucking way." She and Mason worked another hour on the street before it was full of souls while their bodies rotted on the sidewalk. The lights appeared, the mass walked straight into the lights without too much of a fuss, and George tossed most of her stack of Post-Its in the trash can. "This air reeks."

"There’s a pub at that end," Mason answered, pointing toward the bench where Ned and Chuck had taken up residence. "I’m ready to get wasted."

"Weren’t you already wasted this morning?" It was a rhetorical question that Mason answered with an enthusiastic grin. "Fine. I could do with tequila."

"It’s on me, Georgie," he said, slinging his arm over her shoulder. "We should invite them to join us."

"You think she’s hot, don’t you?"

"Maybe a little." Mason smirked when she punched him in the side. "Don’t worry, Georgie. You’re still hotter."

"Fuck you," she answered good-naturedly. As they neared the pair, she separated from Mason’s side. "Sorry for being such a bitch. We’re gonna grab a drink and you should join us."

"We really should go," Ned said. "Chuck’s family will be worried about us."

Chuck looked at George for a long moment before she said, "No, you know they were going to visit Olive today so they probably haven’t even heard. They’re still getting used to not being shut-ins," she explained to George who hadn’t even asked the question. "We’ll stay. I want to hear more about this whole Reaper thing."

"It’s not that complicated," George said, but she took Chuck’s arm and led the way into the pub. After several drinks, Chuck told George the real truth about Ned’s gift, reinforcing the idea that the price paid for Ned’s gift was far too high. She leaned into Chuck and asked, "From one living dead girl to another, do you think the price was worth it?"

Chuck set her hands on her chin and looked at Ned playing darts with Mason. "Sometimes I think it was. The man who died so I could live was a horrible human being, but I wonder about the possibility of it being someone good and kind. My father died so Ned’s mother could live a little while longer. Was it fair to him? Ned brought him back to life and he was furious with both of us. There’s been so much pain with everyone involved. I don’t know."

"You make Ned happy," George said.

"I’m not the only one that could have made him happy," she answered. "Maybe the pain would be worth it if I hadn’t broken my best friend’s heart in the process. I lost my father and nearly lost my aunts and Olive in order to live. Heck, we can’t even touch." She sighed and sipped her white wine. "What did you mean by living dead girl?"

"I died and now I live to take people’s souls until I can die permanently. I don’t have a fucking choice. I kind of wish I had."

"Would you have chosen differently?"

"I don’t know. These days I don’t think I would have, but I had to watch my family grieve for me every day and I couldn’t tell them the truth. I might have done it just to keep from having to watch. I felt like a fucking voyeur in my own life."

They talked for a while longer, but the heaviness of the conversation weighed down on George. From time to time, she glanced at the Post-It in her purse, watching the time edge closer and closer on her watch. With five minutes to spare, she put her hand on Chuck’s and said, "I’m sorry."

"About what?" George showed her the Post-It and watched her eyes widen. She slid her hand down Chuck’s, feeling the soul come out with relative ease. "Do I have time to say goodbye?"

"A few minutes," she said and watched Chuck run toward Ned. There was a heated discussion between them as Mason retreated back toward the table. Ned glared at them both, but Chuck pulled his attention back urgently to deliver instructions that seemed to stun him. She told him clearly that she loved him and kissed him, stilling almost instantly in his arms. He kept kissing her before he gently laid her on the ground and closed her eyes. At George’s side, Chuck smiled and squeezed her arm. "You made your choice."

"One last touch," Chuck answered, touching her lips. "He woke me with a kiss once and now I’ve returned the favor. He needs to be with someone who can live and love him properly. I made him promise to move on and stop grieving for me. He gave me five years of happiness, but I could never do enough for him. And now it’s his time to live."

Ned stalked up to them with an angry expression. "We didn’t stay here so you could steal her soul."

"It was going to happen, Ned," George said and handed him the Post-It. "You can’t avoid fate. You postponed her death for a while, but it wasn’t going to be forever. Trust me, I know from firsthand experience what it means to live beyond death. It’s not a fun thing and some of us spend decades trying to repent enough to finally have peace. Chuck may have been destined to die today, but she made the choice that most people don’t have the chance to make. She got to say goodbye to you and touch you one last time." Chuck turned and walked into her own personal lights, waving at them all. George swallowed and kissed Ned’s warm cheek. "Be grateful you had five years with her. Be grateful that you have someone who loves you, who you can move on with eventually. Most people spend their lives alone and some of us spend our lives after death alone. I was 18 years old when I fucking died, Ned. I hadn’t even had a chance to really be alive. Chuck had far more life than I ever did and had the chance to go out with grace and dignity."

Ned stared at her, his anger fading from his eyes. He still looked really sad, but it was the sort of accepting sadness that came from understanding borrowed time. "You’re not alone, you know."

"What?" George said. He nodded toward Mason who was snoring and drooling on the table. "That’s just Mason."

"You’re not alone either," he repeated. "You have Mason and a Daisy and a Roxy and a couple of other names that sounded like gibberish."

"Thank you." She sat down next to Mason and patted his shoulder. "We should get back to the motel." He muttered something unkind but didn’t wake. Instead, she watched Ned picked up Chuck’s body and carry it through the door. She didn’t envy him the task of telling her family, of putting them through her death all over again. "Mason," she said, finishing her drink and ruffling his hair. "Come on, you can sleep in the car."

As they pulled away from the horrifically quaint town where Ned and Chuck had grown up, Mason leaned against the chair and stared at George with admiration. "You did a really fine thing today, Georgie."

"It’s part of the fucking job, Mason. You know that."

"Not getting to know the soul is part of the job. You sat with Chuck for hours." Before she could say something, he started to snore again. She turned up the radio and thought about the burden Ned carried and the support Chuck had given him, thought about having breakfast every morning with her family. They’ve always been living on borrowed time, but she’s never thought about the days when they’ll disappear from her life the way that Betty did.


End file.
